Latest / It’s All Your Fault: High Conflict People / Walking Away
Transcript
- Speaker 1 (00:00): Speaker 2 (00:05): Welcome to, it's All Your Fault On True Story fm, the one and only podcast dedicated to helping you identify and deal with the most challenging human interactions, those with someone who may have a high conflict personality. I'm Megan Hunter, and I'm here with my co-host, bill Eddie. Speaker 3 (00:22): Hi everybody. Speaker 2 (00:24): We are the co-founders of the High Conflict Institute in San Diego, California, where we focus on training, consulting, and educational programs and methods, all to do with high conflict. In today's episode, we're going to talk about whether to walk away from a high conflict relationship or situation. Sometimes we have a choice, sometimes we don't. But how do you know when it's okay or if it's okay? And then how do you do it? So first though, a couple of notes. Send your high conflict related questions to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or on our website@highconflictinstitute.com slash podcast, where you'll also find all the show notes and links. Speaker 2 (01:11): All right, bill. So walking away, this is a kind of an interesting win. You know, we don't like to walk away from relationships. We all like to have good relationships and friendships and family relationships, but sometimes, you know, we get this question a lot like, when is it okay to walk away? Because I, I'm so exhausted. As, as we've mentioned on a lot of episodes, the three words we hear the most in this, you know, at, at h c I are, I am exhausted from the chaos and I dread seeing this person. It's just a common theme over and over. And when you, when, when you have those, uh, that experience, you have a decision to make, um, in some cases, and it's whether you want to continue being in that. If, you know, there's some, some situations you can use the cars method and be quite successful with it. And others, uh, sometimes, you know, people wonder, maybe it's just better to, to leave this, this relationship. And it, you know, it kind of can depend on whether it's it's family or friends. Sometimes it's, you know, the old saying, and you can pick your friends, but you can't pick, pick your family. But can you That's the question. Speaker 3 (02:24): As adults, I like to think that people do pick their adult family, which may or may not be the family they grew up in, their biological family, et cetera, and we all need families. But sometimes if you've got a high conflict parent, for example, people find that they really can't continue a close relationship with that high conflict parent and become their own person, that there just isn't room for them in the relationship. So you, you hear about, uh, some famous people that won't talk to one of their parents, and I'm always curious, is there a high conflict person here? And who is it? Maybe it's the parent or maybe it's the, you know, the actor that's cut off that parent. It's hard to know. But family members can be the most difficult because they're part of who you are. They're part of your own development, your own thinking, your own sense of self personalities are really formed significantly in the first five or six years of life. Speaker 3 (03:38): And so there's a lot of the parent in you. If it's a lot of dysfunctional stuff, then you may find, you really have to distance yourself from that person in order to find your who you really are. That's just one example, maybe a sibling. And in families, people often are closer or farther without ending relationships. They're just not as close to a sibling. Maybe they talk to the sibling once a year instead of, you know, every week. And there's another sibling they talk to every week. I'm always curious when you have a large family, like six or eight or 10 or 12 kids, there's always alliances and there's always kind of groupings who's close and who's, who's farther apart. But that isn't necessarily mean that they felt they had to walk away. That's just families, adult friendships, adult relationships, dating, all of that. That's where it's more common, maybe. And the question is, if it's a high conflict person, then you need to do it carefully. Speaker 2 (04:51): You know, I read something recently by a, a, a man named Martin Isles. He asked the question, is it ever okay to walk away from, you know, what he calls a toxic person? And, uh, he made a few notes that I thought were interesting. And one of them was, you've tried everything you can, and particularly in maybe in the faith community, you know, in, in our churches and temples we're taught to reconcile, to forgive, to make peace, and you've tried. We try all of those things, but with high conflict people, it doesn't really, that doesn't impact. So it really results in one thing, which is probably you getting hurt. You know, the way he puts it is that hurt mounts up to the point where you are psychologically disintegrating from the festival of gaslighting, manipulation, control, deception, and cruelty. And he calls it, you know, an, an abuse, and that you may well be alone in that struggle because if they're really good at their game, they'll be an angel of light to most people, and nobody's going to believe you. Right? So, um, and he goes on to talk about sociopaths, the narcissist , which I thought was, was pretty interesting. But I, I, I think for the faith-based community we are, or that community is taught to, to just, you know, forgive and you see this lack of understanding the high conflict personality in those, those situations and, and people can really get devastated. Speaker 3 (06:19): Well, it's interesting you say that because there are churches, temples, mosques, that get stuck on high conflict. People, they don't know what to do. And I think you certainly can have empathy for them. You can respect them and still protect yourself from them, and maybe even set limits on your relationship with them, either as an organization or as an individual. Sometimes you have to do that. How you do it is, I guess, where I focus because that you need to do it. Sometimes I think we have to accept as a reality if about 10% of people have high conflict personalities, there's a lot of people they impact, people say we should have empathy for them because that's a, if they have a personality disorder, that's a mental disorder, but they impact so many other people that we have to allow ourselves to set limits on them. And one is walking away from relationships. Speaker 2 (07:21): So when do we kind of hit that point? And, and I, I think for many people, they will continue to forgive. They, they might grovel, they keep trying to resolve the conflict and have conversations and, um, address the problem, address the situation, keep doing nice things for the person, and it just never works. And I think that's probably a point where you do need to sit down and of course, it's individual choice, but to sit down and, and, and think it over truly, and maybe talk to someone else who has good insight and isn't just taking sides and becoming your own negative advocate. Speaker 3 (08:01): Exactly. Exactly. And I think we have to separate two things. One is having empathy and respect for people, and another is being in relationship with them or not, because you can have empathy for someone and respect them and choose to not be in a relationship with them. I think that that helps resolve it, like you're saying in a faith community, is you don't have to be angry. You don't have to be hostile, and yet you can say, this isn't healthy for me, or This isn't healthy for us, and therefore we're setting this limit. That's the key is it's so sad to me how angry people get about high conflict people because they don't understand them and they don't understand what to do. And the anger, you know, circles around and hits other people, impacts children and all of that. To me, it's not about anger and good and bad people. Speaker 3 (09:06): It's about strategies and people being who they are. We're all human beings, and in many ways we're all good people, but some of us have more bad behavior, and we have to set limits on the bad behavior. To me, it's, it's not a question of judgment. Like people say, is this a good character or a bad character? To me it's understanding what's this personality. So like antisocial, which is sociopath the, the hardest in many ways, doesn't care, doesn't have a conscience, all of that. I can have empathy for them, but I sure don't want them in charge of my life or even significantly involved in my life. I see. I think there's a purpose for all of these personalities, and that is to push us. And the question is to push us forward or backward. Sometimes these awful personalities have actually pushed humans forward in some positive new directions, but they can't stop themselves. That's, that's the analysis to me is, is high conflict. People make us better as humanity, but they can't stop themselves. So we have to learn how to set limits on them rather than judge them. Speaker 2 (10:26): Yeah. Yeah. I, I agree completely. And it's, uh, that's really, really fascinating. The, the purpose of personality. I think there's a podcast episode in that, or maybe a book. Speaker 2 (10:36): Trademark . So, yeah, so let's say, you know, you've kind of come to that point where you've tried your best, you've given, you know, you used your best skills, um, or you've been listening to our podcast and, and decided, you know, hey, um, I, I need to make a decision about something. Because if you are dealing with someone who's, who maybe has antisocial traits or full on antisocial, high conflict personality, that's one of the toughest relationships you'll ever have. And it's maybe dangerous, uh, whether, whether dangerous physically or even like reputation wise. Yeah. Like they're, they wanna destroy, Speaker 3 (11:13): That's part of their personality is dominance, conning, people lying, all of that. So let me just briefly say things to consider. The the five high conflict personality types we generally talk about are antisocial or sociopath narcissistic, borderline paranoid and histrionic. Each of those have considerations if you're going to be walking away from the relationship. So starting with antisocial or sociopath, there could be danger. These are people who physically hurt, other people get into fights and families out maybe at work, et cetera. So you have to think in terms of protecting yourself. And you may actually, if you're in a close relationship or married to someone like this, that you may have to be in a safe place when they get the message that you're walking away from the relationship. Likewise, um, borderline personality, borderline personality is very intense around family relationships. Parent, child, husband, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend. Speaker 3 (12:27): Likewise, they could be dangerous at a time. This can be one of the most dangerous times, especially if they've, there's a pattern of domestic violence. The highest risk for serious domestic violence or death is time of separation. So you may be thinking, well, I'm finally getting away from this problem. Well, the problem's gonna get bigger before it gets smaller. So you need to be prepared. Narcissistic, they're less invested frankly, because they want someone else to think they're cool, but they still may feel embarrassed and humiliated if you walk away from them. And this could be family, this could be workplace. A lot of times narcissists, they get fired because of narcissistic behavior and they may be really angry 'cause they feel really humiliated. They may wanna retaliate, paranoid, similar retaliations, part of a theme for them to watch out for. And histrionics very dramatic may tell lots of people, lots of stories about you. Speaker 3 (13:31): So with all five, you want to be careful. You want to think through what's this person's pattern of behavior when somebody walks away from them, what do I know about their history? And think that through and think, what do they do? They're gonna do that when I walk away. So do I need to be physically safe before they know? Do I need to do this in a counselor's office so that we can manage the, the breakup in the workplace? Do I need to have a meeting and human resources present when I say I have to leave this organization? So think in terms of their patterns and how you're going to impact them and how to word what you're doing. And that's an important thing, is don't word what you're doing as it's all their fault. Or don't blame yourself and say, you know, I'm just not geared towards the kind of things that you want. Speaker 3 (14:32): I think it's better to just say, we're different. Our goals are different. Our styles are different perspectives. Yeah. So emphasize difference rather than like who's good and who's bad, or who's, who's competent, who's not. Or you know, don't, you know, say I tell this to lawyers, don't tell your clients that you're not competent to handle their case because everything you've done up to that point may have been beneficial, but they're gonna want all their money back. If you say, I'm not competent to handle, I've discovered that your case is more complicated than I thought. And just say, you know, I realize that your case at this stage needs somebody with X, Y, Z and so I wanna refer Speaker 2 (15:19): You and that's not my specialty. Right? Right. Something like that. That's Speaker 3 (15:23): Not me. And so you're not making it that you did something wrong, it's just where to go from here. Mm. Likewise, in a couple relationship. Don't say I did everything wrong, or you did everything wrong. Say at this point in our lives, and, and people often do this, they say, you know, I'm growing in a different direction. The other person will, please, please don't change, don't grow . And you say, no, no, I really need to. Is something like that is better than saying, you know, I just don't like who you are. Oh, oh, who, what was that movie came out six months ago? The uh, um, Colin Firth and somebody else, the Inni, inni the Banshees of in. Mm. And they, they were like 30 people live on the island and these two guys have been best buddies. And one says, I wanna end our friendship. Speaker 3 (16:18): I don't like you anymore. Well, you, if you saw the movie, you see what comes after he gives that message. That's not a good way to do it, . Anyway, so think it through. That's the, that's the key. Think it through thinking through the steps. It may be small steps, you know, I, I need, I'm busy. I'm gonna be busy a lot the next month, so we're not gonna be able to spend as much time together. Or I have this project that I need to focus on. Don't make it personal and don't, I think make it too sudden it's easier for people to adapt to step by step transitions and the workplace. You may need to say, okay, you're on probation now and then, okay, it's, it's come time where we're gonna have to park company transitions for high conflict people. It's, it's hard for them to process and relationships are the, the hardest. So think it through, Speaker 2 (17:21): Which is easy to do or may not easy, but easier to do in a professional capacity than in your personal life. And I think that's where we see a lot of, you know, people being emotionally hooked. And then we do maybe take a giant step in, in walking away and, uh, it, it can be quite confronting to that person and, and really activate that hatred or anger, um, and retaliation or, you know, that need to just dominate and destroy and, and when, when they destroy, they might destroy your reputation to the rest of the family or to a community. And with social media, it can, you know, kind of spread far and wide when you're really emotionally hooked. I think what I've found is if you have that feeling, if you have a strong feeling about something and you're kind of, you know, it's knocking around in your head and, and you're, you're feeling it in your body and you know, don't go into that conversation if you're having a conversation or the email that you're sending with, with that fe still feeling that strong emotion because it's going to probably disrupt, it's probably going to erupt. Speaker 2 (18:33): Really, there's going to be a, a, a bigger problem because that person's not the high conflict person is going to react. 'cause they're going to do what they're going to do. They're really programmed this way. And if you try to walk away from someone, you know, let's say, uh, you know, with narcissistic or antisocial it immediately it's going to trigger their, their fear of feeling inferior or dominated and they're going to attack back in some way. And you're already feeling bad. Now you're going to feel a whole lot worse. Speaker 3 (19:06): Talk about practicing what you're gonna say in counseling with a counselor, with a therapist and, and talk through what, what are you gonna say? And then what's the other person gonna say and how are you gonna respond to that? This is if you're going to even be having a discussion. Speaker 2 (19:23): Yeah, that's a good question. Speaker 3 (19:24): Because you wanna be safe in high conflict divorces. I tell people sometimes be in a safe place and have your kids safe, and then tell the person that you're getting a divorce from them and have a lawyer who they can immediately talk to and complain about it to and encourage them to get a lawyer but have an intermediary and, and send a letter that says, I want us to do this as peacefully as possible. I think we should try mediation. This could be letter, it could be with a divorce petition. They could be served with a divorce petition and a letter that says, let's work on this and not having a hearing schedule. Just let's work on this in mediation. Let's try to do this, uh, in mediation, compatibly collaboratively. And then if you have to schedule a hearing and get decisions made. But that's the kind of step-by-step approach. Speaker 3 (20:27): But think it through, walk through, if you are like telling the person, 'cause you don't, you don't feel in danger, but you know they're gonna be upset, then practice with a therapist. What you'll say, what they'll say, how you'll respond to each thing they'll say, and one of the things important here, say like, say you're splitting up with somebody with borderline traits is they really want to hold on tight. Abandonment's a big issue for them. And so they're gonna try to pull you back in and say, Hey, well what about this? What about that? And a lot of people who've been living with a borderline have been giving in to walking on eggshells essentially. And so you want to get yourself ready to say, no, I've made up my mind and this is what I want. If you've made up your mind, maybe, and if you haven't get counseling, try a couple's counseling. See if that makes it better. Sometimes it does, often it doesn't. And at least you've given it a try. But just say, this is where I am so you don't backtrack. Say, oh, okay, well I won't move out. Then think through what you're gonna do. Speaker 2 (21:41): That's such a hard one, right? It's a tough spot. And when people are in that situation, because you don't want to hurt the other person or you don't even know what to say, you want out desperately, but I mean people really feel stuck with, with this. Speaker 3 (21:55): Yeah. And let it go step by step. Say, well, we'll keep talking, let's go to couple's counseling and talk about this, but don't reverse course. If you've made up your mind, don't waffle in reverse course. Just go step by step forward. 'cause what happens when the person thinks you're coming back into the relationship is they become more vulnerable. And then when it becomes clear you're leaving, they're more upset. And that's, that's something you, you wanna avoid. There's a term some people call hoovering, and that is you're saying, I wanna leave the relationship and they try to suck you back in. That's hoovering like a vacuum cleaner. Some people wonder where Hoovering comes from. , it used to be one of the most popular vacuum cleaners, so it would suck you back in. And this happens sometimes people start having sex with you and you go, oh, well, you know, this does still feel good, or this was the best part of our relationship. And you end up back into the relationship, you've gotta be ready to say, no, I'm not going to walk backwards, but I'm not gonna rush forward. We'll take our Speaker 2 (23:08): Time no more. Yo-yo . Right? Speaker 3 (23:11): Right. Yeah. Speaker 2 (23:12): Yeah. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a challenge, but it, it's, you know, to your point about telling them what you're going to do, that's part of setting limits. And I think that's, um, somewhat of a misunderstood concept. Um, and it's, it's really a powerful tool that we have. And, and if we are, if we do make the decision to walk away from a relationship, as you remember, I'm not walking on eggshells around this person any longer. I'm going to tell them what I'm going to do. I'll do it in small steps. I'll do it with empathy, attention and respect, but I'm still going to do what I'm going to do. And in the, and you know, we, we receive so many stories and reports from people who are just terrified of this conversation. And they live for years sort of being battered about emotionally and they're, they're very afraid Speaker 3 (23:59): Sometimes physically. Speaker 2 (24:01): Right, right. Speaker 3 (24:02): And they're, and they're right to be afraid, so they gotta pay attention to that and prepare. Speaker 2 (24:07): Yes. Yes. So, good. Well, any last thoughts on this Bill? Speaker 3 (24:12): Just, you know, I really encourage counseling in making the decision because sometimes, sometimes there may be something you can do to make things better. Sometimes let's say you've got a child who's 16 and two more years of high school and you don't want to end up in a big custody battle and a lot of high conflict people will put you through that and you fear, well, can I hang in here two more years until the child finished his high school? And I've consulted with people that have made that decision, but they have to think it through. And other people have said, two more years of this, this is just not gonna work. So get ready to do it now. Hmm. Speaker 2 (24:54): Okay. Very good. Well, uh, listeners, we, we appreciate you listening and, and hopefully this has been helpful for you. Let us know if you have any questions about it. Next week we're going to talk about a concept or a, i, I guess the experience and phenomenon of splitting. It's a kind of a big topic, so be prepared for that. In the meantime, if you have questions, please send them to podcast@highconflictinstitute.com or submit them to high conflict institute.com/podcast. Until next time, keep learning and practicing these skills. Be kind to yourself, be kind to others while we all try to find the missing piece. It's All Your Fault is a production of True Story FM Engineering by Andy Nelson. Music, by Wolf Samuels, John Coggins and Ziv Moran finds the show, show notes and transcripts at True Story fm or high conflict institute.com/podcast. If your podcast app allows ratings and reviews, please consider doing that for our show.